SAN DIEGO (CNS) - A 20-year-old man suffered possibly serious injuries Tuesday when his friend's pit bull attacked him without provocation outside the dog owner's Mountain View home, authorities reported.
The year-old male canine went after the victim in the 4400 block of Logan Avenue shortly before noon, according to the county Department of Animal Services.
Medics took the injured man to a hospital for treatment of a potentially severe wound to one of his arms and less significant injuries to his back and side, DAS spokesman Dan DeSousa said.
The dog had no known prior history of aggressive behavior.
"The victim doesn't know why it happened," DeSousa said. "He's known the dog since it was a puppy."
Animal-control officers impounded the dog and took it to the county's Gaines Street shelter, where it will be held for a 10-day rabies quarantine.
The injured man told police he did not want the owner of the pit bull to face any charges over the incident, according to DeSousa.
The dog attack was at least the fourth reported in the San Diego area over the last 10 days.
On June 18, a 75-year-old Paradise Hills woman was mauled in her yard by a neighbor's two escaped pit bull terriers. Her injuries were so severe that doctors had to amputate her left leg and feared she might ultimately lose one of her arms as well.
The dogs were taken to a shelter and euthanized.
Last Friday, aggressive canines left a woman and a baby with minor facial injuries in unrelated attacks. The first happened about 10:45 a.m., when a pit bull and a boxer went after a woman and one of her three dogs as she was walking them on 28th Street in the Grant Hill district of San Diego.
When the woman tried to protect her Shetland sheepdog, one of the fighting-breed dogs nipped her on the face, DeSousa said.
The victim declined medical attention and took her sheltie, which apparently was not seriously injured, to a veterinarian.
The two aggressive dogs were impounded for rabies quarantine.
Later that morning, a shepherd mix bit a year-old girl on the forehead at a home in Chula Vista, police reported. The child was taken to a hospital, where she received stitches for a small gash above one of her eyes.
The victim's parents had the dog put down.
